Recipe // Sticky Chocolate Wonka Brownies (courtesy of Isabella) ♡

Hello there! Me and Isabella made brownies over the weekend and I thought I'd post the recipe because they came out really well, this is Isabella's recipe not mine but we added Wonka bar to the original recipe, I'm not sure if she made it up or found it somewhere else but  I also like making recipe posts and I'd like to do more so if that's something you'd like please comment :)

What you'll need:

• 100g unsalted butter
• 175g caster sugar
• 75g dark sugar
• 150g milk chocolate
• 1 tablespoon of golden syrup
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon of chocolate/vanilla flavouring
• 2 tablespoons of cocoa powder
• 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder
• 1 bar of Wonka Millionaire Shortbread 

Instructions:

1. lightly grease a 20cm/5 inch shallow square cake tin

2. place butter, sugar, chocolate and syrup in a sauce pan. Heat gently, stirring until the mixture is blended and smooth

3. leave to cool, beat together eggs and vanilla, whisk in chocolate mixture

4. sieve together flour, cocoa powder and baking powder and fold carefully into the egg and chocolate mixture, use metal spoon or spatula. Put in tin, add broken up squares of Wonka bar and any extra milk chocolate you may have, and cook for 25 minutes until edges shrink away from tin, leave to cool (it should be quite gooey so don't put it in for longer if it's gooey), cut up and eat :)

These were basically the best brownies I have ever had in my lifetime, I'll definitely be making them again. I thought brownies were good shopbought, I had never made them before but they are so much  better homemade, imagine chewey on the outside and gooey on the inside and there you have it. Hope you liked reading this and attempt this yourselves, please leave a comment if you'd like to see more recipe posts :)

Collective January Haul 2014 ft. Isabella: Primark , New Look,Superdrug and More ♡

Hello there people, I have been shopping a few times in January so I thought I would show you what I have gotten as on each trip I haven't bought a great deal but together it makes a substantial haul. I went out with Isabella yesterday and got some cool stuff, we also baked brownies so I might do a separate blogpost with the recipe on there :)

1. Beatles Shirt (Primark) - £8

    Frilly Dolly Socks (Primark) - £1.50 each 

    Hello Kitty and Tatty Teddy Socks (B&M) - 99p each

I didn't buy this with Isabella but I thought I would still show it, I've had quite the obsession with socks recently because I've gotten some Dr Marten shoes which show off my socks so I've come to the realisation that I need more socks. I love love love Hello Kitty and Tatty Teddy, and I think frilly socks are nice to wear if you're wearing 'grown up' type clothes or bands shirts because then it shows you're mature but a bit childish too.

2. Pop Tarts t-shirt (New Look) - usually £12.99 but with student discount it was about £10.37 

I found this shirt in New Look and although I've sort of made a new years resolution to buy less t-shirts, I felt I had to buy this because anyone who knows me knows that pop tarts are one of my favourite things in the world, it has gotten to the point where people who I barely know in sixth form will come up to me just to tell me that they tried pop tarts, pictures are 3 types of pop tarts: chocolate chip cookie dough, blueberry and chocolate chip which were all £3.50 in tesco, one of them Isabella gave me for Christmas but I'll get onto what she gave me for Christmas later :)

3. Clueless (B&M) - £2.99

    Tatty Teddy Socks (B&M) - 99p

B&M isn't a shop I see everywhere, in fact I only know of two but if you know of one you really need to go there because you can get practically everything there at reduced prices. Even pop tarts! Unfortunately there weren't any when I went with Isabella yesterday. I picked up Clueless because me and Isabella started watching it the last time we met up but we didn't finish it and we watched the last half hour yesterday, I just thought I'd buy it because it's a good price and a film I feel I should own and it can take a place next to Mean Girls. I've already explained my newfound obsession for childish socks so I won't go into more details.

4. Baby Lips (Superdrug ) - £2.99 each but in a deal that was like buy one get one half price
    Free sample of Nivea Deodorant (Superdrug) 

I have wanted Baby Lips for what feels like forever, you can see this in one of my old wishlists. I have heard from reviews and people I know that these two are the most popular, I really like the idea of them because they smell good and tint your lips but feel more like a lip balm than a lipstick. Isabella got the peach flavour which is funny because her nickname is peaches and she picked it up without knowing it was peaches. We got offered a free sample of this deodorant too, my Mum brought up the point that it may have been offered to us because we smell but obviously I accepted it and I think it's a nice compact size so I can keep it in my bag for school or satchel for when I go out. If you want a review of baby lips I can do that so comment below if you'd like to see that :)

5. Frilly dolly socks (Primark) - £1.50

    Alice in Wonderland Socks (Primark) - £2.50

I picked up some more dolly socks (I think that's what they're called) in an off-white colour because I already have white ones, black ones, and grey ones. I figure if I can get at least 7, I can wear them everyday. I've seen loads of people pick up the Disney socks in primark and I was very tempted, they had Snow White, the Little Mermaid, Bambi, Tinkerbell and these. I would've bought them all had they not been £2.50 each because that's a lot for socks and I would've ended up spending over a tenner, but these feel so soft, I'm a little worried about whether the colour will wash out but oh well.

6. Lolita glasses (Poundland) - £1

Me and Isabella just like buying accessories when we go out even if we're not going to wear them again, these are not quite Lolita glasses because the shades aren't black but they're close enough and we were both reading Lolita at the same time plus it reminded us of Lana Del Rey who we both love. 

7. Isabella's Christmas Presents to me

I would've included my Christmas presents from Isabella and Antoinette in my Christmas Haul but we didn't exchange Christmas presents until last week but I still wanted to show you. Isabella bought me a box of the pop tarts from America, that sounds stupid because they're all from America but some of them are cheaper because they're sold in England more but these ones aren't so yay! Also she bought me a Winnie the Pooh toy and a Roo toy which is so cute, I was with her when she bought them and they are in a deal at the moment, they were like £6.99 each which is amazing for Disney toys plus they're fairly big.

8. Antoinette's Christmas Present to me

What you may or may not know is that me and my friends are obsessed with Harry Potter, especially after going to the tours (which you can see a blogpost about here) and I am completely and utterly in love with Draco Malfoy (and Tom Felton) so now I have a cushion.. with his face on.. in my bed.. which is great :D

9. Black Cardigan (Primark) - £10 but charged £5

First things first, I am a bit confused about the price of this. Before I picked it up, I thought it would be £12 or £14 like all Primark cardigans but then it said £10 which was a pleasant enough surprise, then they only charged me £5 at the counter which is such a bargain. I bought it two sizes too big so it's really cosy and baggy, I wanted one just like this as I mentioned in my wishlist so that's awesome.

10. The food me and Isabella bought.. 

Before you judge us, we really didn't eat that much from here, I reckon we were hungry when we bought it because we ended up dividing most of it up and I took it home, we used some of the chocolate to make brownies which tasted so good and I'm thinking of doing a recipe blogpost on those, if you want to see that please comment, we spent the rest of our day after shopping watching the end of Clueless and watching Ferris Bueller's day off as well as making brownies.

Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed seeing what I've bought over the last month :)

Tag Tuesday #3: The Procrastinating Beauty Blogger Tag ♡

Hello there people of the internet!
So for the third instalment of Tag Tuesday, I have decided to do the procrastinating beauty blogger tag which I saw here. It looked like an interesting tag and I will tag some people to do these tags each week or whenever I do an instalment if I have been particularly enjoying their blog recently or would like to see them answer these questions :)

1. Name a beauty regime that you rarely do? 
I never really use eye-shadow on my eyelids, I use a bit of dark brown to fill in my eyebrows but I haven't really used eye-shadow where it's meant to be used since I was about 14. I still cringe when I think about how I used to overload on the black eye-shadow when I was 12, it wasn't so bad when I aged a bit but I think it's too much to use on a day to day basis and if I do use it it has to be neutral colours.

2. Is washing your make-up brushes something that you do regularly?
I procrastinate so much that I have even put off buying make-up brushes! Honestly though, I don't feel that I really need make-up brushes. I don't wear foundation and my concealer only goes in a few places, plus I've read lots of things saying that it makes the make-up look cakey. I can almost guarantee that if I did have some they would not get cleaned very often..

3. How long will you last with chipped nail polish?
I hate the look and feel of chipped nail polish on my nails so much that I restrain from using nail polish in the first place, if my nail polish has chipped I usually take it off within a day.

4. How long will you put off buying/replacing a beauty product, even if you need it?
Just until the next time I go out, I wouldn't make a trip to specifically buy something like mascara or eye liner because I have spares that I can turn to - that's smart thinking right there.

5. What is your worst beauty habit?
I don't have any particularly bad ones but if my mascara or eye liner has smudged and I'm in a rush I'll just use concealer to cover it because I am lazy.

6. Name something non-beauty related that you put off doing all the time?
Besides from homework and revision? (Mock results are out this week..) I put off going off my laptop in the evenings until I've spent half an hour extra on there than I meant to staring vacantly at my tumblr dashboard, I also put off changing my bed covers, I am literally so bad at changing my bed covers because they keep springing off - I've managed to get my time down to ten minutes though.

7. When going out somewhere, do you leave getting ready to the last minute?
No not at all, I hate being late and I want my make-up to look its best so I want to have time to re-do it if I have to.

8. Can you commit to spending bans?
I could but I don't feel I need to, I don't buy top end make-up and my make-up lasts me for quite a long time. I'm not too adventurous with make-up so I usually find a cheaper brand that I like (I really like miss sporty..) and stick with that, then I am usually given make-up for my birthday or Christmas that tides me over for a while.

9. How organized is your make-up and nail polish collections?
My make-up is organised sort of in a make-up bag, my nail polish is not very organised at all.. I have my make-up bag and my sprays of sorts and my nail polish in a tray type of thing so I know where it is but it doesn't look organised, I also have nail polishes in a shelf cubicle type thing above my bed (which I bang my head on a lot) but my nail polish collection doesn't feel very organised.

I tag:
- Abbie
- Amy

I have been quite enjoying their blogs over the last week so go and check them out :)

Thanks for reading, I am thinking of ending my Tag Tuesday series after next week because I have been doing it for 3 weeks and I'm not enjoying it as much as I hoped I would. I should be doing some sort of haul on the weekend hopefully and perhaps an empties post soon though so I'll keep you posted ♡ 

Tag Tuesday #2: The Disney Tag ♡

Hello there! So it is Tuesday and as part of Tag Tuesday, I have a tag. This one is the Disney tag and I found it here, hope you enjoy reading it as I'm a huge Disney fan and this looked interesting :)

1. A scene in any Disney movie you wish you could experience

Hm this is a hard question, but I think I'm going to go with the carpet ride with Jasmine and Aladdin in Aladdin because it looks fun and romantic and lovely.

2. An unforgettable experience/moment you've had at the Parks

I've not really had any, I went to Disneyland Paris but I am yet to go to the one in Orlando and I went to the one in Paris when I was young so there wasn't much that stood out for me as an unforgettable moment..

3. What non-Disney song(s) reminds you or brings back memories of Disney and/or the Parks? 

It's a small world

4.When was the first time you went to a Disney Park?

When I was about 10 I think

5.If you could choose any of the characters to be your best friend, who would you choose?

Probably Belle because she loves to read and she is quiet and sensitive, I think she would understand if I wanted to sit in a corner and read rather than talk

6.Who are your favorite Disney princesses?

Belle, Mulan and Pocahontas. They're all quite strong minded, Belle doesn't allow the sexist pig to get her (I actually had a crush on Gaston when I was younger, I don't quite understand why I always go after the bad guys in films..), Mulan doesn't just accept that she can't go to war, she still goes and does it and even though she has to dress up as a man, in the sequel she is able to be herself and lead the others, and Pocahontas broke the racial barrier and basically hooked up with John Smith.

7.Name a scene/moment in any Disney movie that never fails to make you cry.

The only one that is coming to mind is in Mulan 2 where Shang 'dies' and I remember my heart just dropping the first time and whilst I didn't bawl I did shed a few tears.

8.What is the first Disney movie you remember seeing?

I've been told that it was Toy story 2 or Tarzan, but I don't remember much about these in the cinemas. I remember watching Cinderella a lot when I was younger.

9.What is your favorite Disney movie?

I have several because I love Disney so much (enough to have a disney themed birthday party which you can see pictures of here), but probably Hunchback of Notre Dame, I think it is a bit darker than the usual Disney films and I absolutely adore the music in it, the only thing that annoys me about it is that Quasimodo doesn't get the girl, he was essentially friendzoned but besides from that..

Thanks for reading, I hope you decide to do this tag as well because if you love disney it would be really interesting to read :)

January Wishlist 2014 ♡

January Wishlist 2014 ♡ by bess-oates featuring a peter pan collar dress

Oh My Love peter pan collar dress
$64 - topshop.com

Topshop black top
topshop.com

Mini circle skirt
$20 - newlook.com

Tag Tuesday #1: Thankful for Blogger Friends Tag ♡

Hello there!
So I said in a post a while ago (I think) that I wanted to do less tags because sometimes I'll do tags everyday so now I'm going to restrict it to once a week or less, the basic idea being that I do it on a Tuesday hence the title Tag Tuesday so that my blog does have tags sometimes but so it's not just tag after tag after tag.

I was tagged in the Thankful for Blogger Friends tag by Charlotte and you can see her post here, she seems really lovely and I really enjoy reading her posts so please check her out and follow her :)
This tag is split into two parts, the first part being about blogging in general and the second part being random questions about myself. On with the show!

Blogging and I:

1. How long have you been blogging? My first post went up some time in August, maybe a week or two before my GCSE results came out. I was probably thinking I was going to fail all of my exams and I needed to do something productive haha.

2. Are there any bloggers who helped you out/encouraged you when you first started your blog? I wouldn't name anyone specifically because all of my followers seem to encourage me with kind comments.

3. What Social Media has given you the most traffic to your blog? Is there a platform that you don’t use? According to my stats on here, I get quite a lot of traffic from tumblr probably because if I write a new post I'll usually post a link on there. I sometimes post links to blogposts on twitter too, but most of my traffic comes from tumblr and other bloggers on here referring their followers to me haha. I don't really use weheartit or pinterest, I have an account on pinterest but I've not really gotten into it however every now and then I'll look at their DIY posts on there - being the Potterhead I am I'd really like to make lots of Harry Potter themed items, I am currently knitting a Gryffindor scarf with the help of my Mum.

4. How often do you post? Do you have a regular schedule? I don't really have a schedule, if my heart isn't in a post then I will most likely not post it. I usually make a post at least once a week though. I don't really think 'oh gosh I haven't posted I need to go and post something' because if I know I wouldn't read that post then I don't see the point of writing it/

5. Where do you blog? Usually from my bed haha

6. What camera do you use? What photo editing software do you use? I just use my iPhone 4s, I do want to purchase a Canon 600D but the problem is that it's expensive and I haven't quite persuaded my parents that it would be a good purchase yet however I'm hoping to get a job and hopefully I can work up enough money to buy one. I use the app 'vscocam' to edit my pictures, it's the same one I use to edit my photos for instagram but I usually use a different filter for blog photos.

7. How did you come up with your blog name? I'm absolutely terrible at coming up with usernames or URLs (I've changed my tumblr URL many times) so it took a couple of changes to get this one. I was just thinking of those flower crowns you can get and how people sometimes make daisychain crowns, and princesses wear crowns right? I was actually wanting to change my blog URL - thoughts?

8. Do you do any regular “series” posts on your blog? I do Music Monday but that's not exactly regular, that's more of something I do once a month and I've only done it a couple of times. This is my only 'series' type thing, I don't know if Tag Tuesday will take off, I just want to stop clogging up my blog with tags because I do them far too often haha.

9. What draws you to a blog? A nice layout and posts that I know I'm going to read, I'm always drawn to blogs that have a lot of Primark hauls.

10. What turns you off of a blog? Not having the option to follow via GFC, and if I know that the blog isn't my style. It's all well and good that you can get away with outfits like those but it's not me and I wish you all the best but.. well I'd rather follow a blog that I can read pretty much all of the posts and be interested in them.

11. How many blogs do you subscribe to? Are they all beauty related? I read a lot of blogs so I'm not going to say how many I follow, they're not all beauty related. Most are fashion and beauty, but I follow one or two recipe blogs and I quite like personal blogs too.

12. When do you generally read blogs? In the evening or afternoon with a herbal tea

13. What is your favorite/least favourite type of post, and why? My favourite posts are primark hauls because I love primark but I prefer going when I know what type of things are in stock so I can sort of plan how much I'll want to spend. I don't much like reading nails of the day posts because I'm not much of a nail polish person and the nail polish people are wearing doesn't interest me very much.

Some facts about me:

1. Where do you live? Tell us a bit about your city! I live in North West London under an hour away from the centre. It's a nice area because there are open green spaces but also lots of options for shopping.

2. What about your home? I think my house was built over 50 years ago. The man who built it built most of the houses on my road but built my house for himself so originally the plot took up the size of two or three houses but then he sold off the land. 

3. Single or taken? Single haha

4. Do you have children? No no

5. Do you have pets? No, I once had a fish but she died. When I picked her out in the store she was swimming away from all the other fish so I thought she needed a friend, my parents didn't tell me she was clearly the sickest one in the tank, then she didn't eat anything and a few months later she died..

6. Do you have a “day job”? Unless fangirling over fictional characters counts as having a day job, no no I don't

7. How tall are you? I'm 168cm which is just under 5"7

8. Do you have siblings? Yes, I have a younger brother and two older half sisters.

9. 3 words to describe yourself. Sarcastic, obsessive, enigmatic 

10. Who is your style icon, and why? I don't really have a style icon, but I quite like the way Molly Ringwald dressed in the 80s haha

11. 3 favorite bands or musicians. The Beatles, The Smiths, and then for my third it comes between Ben Folds Five and Arctic Monkeys and I can't really make that decisions so have four favourites haha

12. 3 favorite movies. Talk about a hard question.. Back to the future, Bridget Jones' Diary and Pretty in Pink but I feel like this changes all the time depending on the mood I'm in

13. 3 favorite books. John, any of the Harry Potter books.. (does that count as one? I'm counting it as one), and  Little Women

14. 3 random/weird facts about you.

• I have never ordered anything from Starbucks
• I love Hugh Grant films even though I find rom-coms really cheesy, he has such charm I don't know
• I was sorted into Gryffindor on Pottermore (if  you want to add me, you can do so here)

I quite enjoyed doing this tag, and I hope this was a good start to my new series - Tag Tuesday. I've not exactly made it a series to keep you my followers excited for every Tuesday because I'll upload a tag, but more so I don't post lots of tags and I can restrict it a little bit. I will try and do more varied tags that aren't so focused on beauty and fashion too, thanks for reading :)

I tag all of you to this because I consider you all to be my blogging buddies, please post links to your answers to these questions because I love to read them!!

♡

Liebster Award #3

Hello there!
I know I've done the Liebster Award a couple of times but I was tagged in it by Maggie and I felt like doing it so I thought I would, after all the questions are never the same and it's a nice opportunity to find new blogs to follow :-)

Rules:

-Make a post about the Liebster award and thank the blogger who nominated you

-Write 11 interesting facts about yourself

-Answer 11 questions created by the blogger who nominated you

-Nominate 11 other bloggers (the must have less than 200 followers) and notify them that you nominated them

-Write 11 new questions for your nominees

11 facts about myself:

1. I am a huge Potterhead and this has recently come more to the surface after going to the Harry Potter Studios, I am actually re-reading the series and I read half of the first book in one night because I physically couldn't put it down.

2. I am currently doing grade 8 piano

3. I would like to learn more instruments but I fear it's too late

4. I love 80s films, I can watch Back to the Future and the Brat Pack films any time over and over again

5. I really like watching musicals, especially if Judy Garland is in them

6. I have a ridiculous crush on Tom Felton

7. I would really like to see Morrissey in concert but I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to because he's taking so long with coming out with his next album 

8. If I could I would buy every single soft toy from the Disney store

9. I cannot wait for the Sims 4 to come out

10. I am learning how to knit and I hope I am able to do it well by the end of 2014

11. Every year in December/January I watch Bridget Jones 1 and 2, it's just a tradition for me

Maggie's Questions:

1. What made you want to start blogging? I really enjoyed watching Zoella and Sprinkleofglitter's videos on youtube and they did a video together about starting a blog, and I had always been interested in primark hauls and things like that so I figured I could do it.

2. Who are your fashion inspirations? I'm not really into what's 'in style' but Twiggy I guess

3. Where would be your dream place to live? Central London, I really like London but the area I live in feels very small and I can almost certainly guarantee I'll see a chav from my high school when I go to the shops so I always make myself go further afield

4. What country would you most like to travel to? Italy, I've never been but it looks lovely.

5. What is one beauty product you could not live without? Liquid eyeliner

6. What would you describe your style as in one word? Indescribable 

7. What is one article of clothing you can't live without? My skirt, I am not confident enough to wear jeans any more so I wear skirts all the time

8. Coffee or Hot Cocoa? I prefer hot chocolate to cocoa, so I suppose I'll pick coffee in this instance.

9. What is your favorite season? Spring

10. If you could go on an all-expense paid shopping spree, which store would you go to? Topshop

11. What is your blogging goal for 2014? Do tag posts less often, maybe once a month. Do more varied posts.

I nominate:

- Olivia F

- Katie

- Bethany

- Rosy

- Aida

- Olivia

- Madeline

- Amy

- Claire

- Abigail-Alice

- Shameta

My questions:

1. What is your favourite thing to drink on a freezing cold evening?

2. What is your favourite TV show at the moment?

3. Skirts or jeans?

4. Do you like boyfriend jeans?

5. Do you have any interest in driving?

6. How do you relax?

7. Do you prefer to go shopping alone or with other people?

8. What is your favourite book?

9. Do you have any new years resolutions?

10. Have you got a calender for 2014? If so, what pictures are on there?

11. How long have you been running your blog for?

I hope you enjoyed reading my answers, I haven't done a 'tag' in ages so it was good to do it :)

2014 Reading Challenge ♡

Happy New Year people on the interwebs!

I know many of you have probably been making new years resolutions (or completely poo-poo-ing the idea) but I have sort of made a resolution myself for the first time I think. I can't remember any other resolutions I've made, perhaps I made them and failed so decided to block it out from my memory.

Anyway, I've set myself a reading goal on the website Goodreads for 2014. My goal is to read 15 books this year, that might not sound a lot to you but I haven't done much reading since GCSEs and now A levels. 7 of those books will be Harry Potter because after going to the studio tour I feel I need to read it again, also I've been physically unable to watch the films after having a movie marathon after the tour - I am emotionally broken, I can barely watch clips without dying internally. I'm also wanting to read the Bell Jar which I received for Christmas, I'm hoping to read a lot more this year. If you want to add me on Goodreads, you can do so here. I'll accept anyone as a friend on there. It's a cool but geeky website I suppose, you can rate books, add books to your 'to-read' list, add favourites, write reviews, do quizzes, and there are forums so you can discuss the books - I took some enjoyment in discussing a Jaqueline Wilson book from my childhood on there.

That's all for now, I was thinking of doing book reviews on here too but I'm not sure. If that's what you'd like to see then please comment, thanks :)